Mantidactylus curtus Boulenger 1882

Mantidactylus curtus clade This clade comprises several small to large-sized species (23.4–65.0 mm adult SVL) typically characterized by a relatively short snout and short hindlimbs, sometimes a weakly developed frenal stripe (very rare in other Brygoomantis), and occurrences either in the Central Region or in the western regions of Madagascar (South, West and North-West), including several montane species: Mantidactylus curtus, M. alutus, M. ambohimitombi, M. bourgati, M. madecassus, M. pauliani, as well as one new species and two new subspecies named herein (holotypes are depicted in Fig.9). The M.curtus clade was particularly difficult to revise because the calls of most species are— even by the standards of Brygoomantis —highly inconspicuous and rarely heard, and differences between males and females are not easy to recognise externally (males often have rather indistinct femoral glands, not too different from the gland rudiments of females). Two exceptions to this are M. alutus, a small-sized species with distinct femoral glands in males and distinct calls, and M. mahery sp. nov., a widespread species in the West, reaching into the North West and into the South (Isalo). Furthermore, our analysis with the Phylonetworks package suggested two instances of reticulated evolution in this clade (see above), which further complicates taxonomic inference.
Published as part of Scherz, Mark D., Crottini, Angelica, Hutter, Carl R., Hildenbrand, Andrea, Andreone, Franco, Fulgence, Thio Rosin, Köhler, Gunther, Ndriantsoa, Serge Herilala, Ohler, Annemarie, Preick, Michaela, Rakotoarison, Andolalao, Rancilhac, Loïs, Raselimanana, Achille P., Riemann, Jana C., Rödel, Mark-Oliver, Rosa, Gonçalo M., Streicher, Jeffrey W., Vieites, David R., Köhler, Jörn, Hofreiter, Michael, Glaw, Frank & Vences, Miguel, 2022, An inordinate fondness for inconspicuous brown frogs: integration of phylogenomics, archival DNA analysis, morphology, and bioacoustics yields 24 new taxa in the subgenus Brygoomantis (genus Mantidactylus) from Madagascar, pp. 113-311 in Megataxa 7 (2) on page 166, DOI: 10.11646/megataxa.7.2.1, http://zenodo.org/record/7441023